We must expect everything and fear everything from time and from men.

We can console ourselves for not having great talents as we console ourselves for not having great places. We can be above both in our hearts.

Men crowd into honorable careers without other vocation than their vanity, or at best their love of fame.

Sometimes a lengthened period of prosperity melts away in a moment; just as the heat of summer flies before a day of tempest.

A new principle is an inexhaustible source of new views.

As soon as an opinion becomes common it is sufficient reason for men to abandon it and to uphold the opposite opinion until that in its turn grows old, and they require to distinguish themselves by other things. Thus if they attain their goal in some art or science, we must expect them soon to cast it aside to acquire some fresh fame, and this is partly the reason why the most splendid ages degenerate so quickly, and, scarcely emerged from barbarism, plunge into it again.

Few people are modest enough to be estimated at their true worth.